Suchergebnisse

`Scientific history of philosophy' was one of the professional branches of Soviet philosophy, and a place where philosophical culture was preserved in an often hostile environment. Situated between the ideological exigencies of the Soviet system with its Marxist-Leninist `theoretical foundation' and the need for an objective account of philosophy's past, Soviet history of philosophy displays the characteristic features of Soviet philosophy as a whole, including a forceful reappearance of its Hegelian background. This book is the only Western monograph on this important part of Soviet philosophy, thus filling the last main gap in Western `Philosophical Sovietology'. At the same time, it offers the first survey of Soviet philosophy after the disappearance of the Soviet system itself, embarking on an historical and meta-philosophical investigation of Soviet philosophical culture. The book will be of interest to students of Soviet and Russian philosophy, historians of philosophy and specialists in Soviet studies

Opens a window on the ways in which Russian thinkers have historically considered the political. Political philosophy in Russia has always sought, and sometimes found, a middle way between embracing anarchy and searching for authority. Political philosophy in Russia has never before been the subject of a scholarly monograph. While historical factors make this understandable, the topic deserves our attention more than ever, now that Russia, after a short Soviet century, has regained self-assurance as a world power. Its unique historical trajectory, and the specific role of philosophy in it, are of interest to many fields of research and, beyond that, broader audiences. A focus on political philosophy as it existed and exists in Russia despite periods of marginalisation and suppression, allows us to understand its specific character, importance and relevance, and to realise that, in trying to think philosophically, critically, and reflectively about the political reality that shapes them, Russian thinkers are not essentially different from philosophers elsewhere. Hence, many lessons that can be learned from this subject.

Abstract
Vladimir Solov'ëv, informal "founder" of the current of Russian religious philosophy which gained some prominence in the early 20th C with thinkers like N. Berdyaev, S. Frank and S. Bulgakov, based his social and political philosophy as well as his program of "Christian politics" (an attempt to bring the world as close to the Kingdom of God as possible, while steering clear from any idea of "building" God's Kingdom on Earth) on a series of personal mystical encounters with Sophia, understood by him as, simultaneously, Eternal Femininity, Divine Wisdom and World Soul. The paper argues that this vision remained the foundation of his entire world-view, despite the fact that he initially articulated a more "utopian" vision of a world-encompassing "free theocracy," while later in his career he elaborated, in Opravdanie dobra [The Justification of the (Moral) Good], a more realistic, but still "ideal-theoretical" vision of a just Christian state. Highlighting the tension between Solov'ëv's advocacy of a free and plural sphere of public debate and his own "prophetic" position based on privileged access to divine wisdom, the paper ends with a discussion of the intrinsic and unsolvable tension between religion and politics, and with the claim that there is a fundamental opposition between holistic mystical visions and a recognition of the political, understood as the ubiquitous possibility of both conflict and concord among humans.